Automated surgery on humans may be a step closer after an AI-powered robotic system carried out procedures that researchers say is the first ‘realistic’ machine surgery with virtually no human intervention.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore trained the AI algorithms on video footage of human surgeons carrying out operations on organs taken from dead pigs.
The system, known as Surgical Robot Transformer-Hierarchy, or SRT-H, uses two levels of AI.
The first watched and analysed around 16,000 motions captured on the footage via an endoscope.
It also issues simple-language instructions such as ‘clip the second duct’, which are translated into precise three-dimensional tool movements by the second level of AI.
The AI controls a robotic system equipped with tools enabling it to grab, clip and cut soft tissue.
A procedure to separate a pig gall bladder from the liver was carried out eight times, achieving a 100% success rate in all 17 separate tasks involved in the operation.
There were a number of instances where the robot self-corrected, meaning that it was able to take a different approach when scientists threw ‘curveballs’, such as adding blood-like dyes that changed the appearance of the gallbladder and surrounding tissues.
Robot surgeon performed tasks ‘less jerkily’ than human counterparts
The trial, which was detailed in the journal Science Robotics, also found that the robotic system was less jerky than human surgeons and plotted shorter trajectories between tasks.
The robot did take longer than human medics to perform the same operations, however.
The researchers called the study “a milestone toward clinical deployment of autonomous surgical systems”.
Danail Stoyanov, Professor of Robot Vision at University College London, told New Scientist that the study “really highlights the art of the possible with AI and surgical robotics”.
Autonomous surgery is still a long way from clinical deployment, however, as robots still need to be tested on living material.
Around 70,000 robotic procedures are carried out every year on the NHS in England alone, but these are fully controlled under human guidance.
Only certain procedures, such as cutting bone for hip and knee surgery, are done semi-autonomously.
Health secretary Wes Streeting has said that increased use of robotic surgery is a key part of the government’s 10-year plan for the NHS.
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